I recently received a copy of Fearless: Imagine Your Life Without Fear, by Max Lucado for review. As the title suggests, Lucado employs his warm narrative approach to encourage readers to break free from their fears and live faith-filled lives in Christ.

In order to do this, though, we must first recognize and identify how great a hold fear has on many of our lives. As Lucado writes in the first chapter:

We fear being sued, finishing last, going broke; we fear the mole on the back, the new kid on the block, the sound of the clock as it ticks us closer to the grave.

If you are already a fan of Lucado’s work, then you will undoubtedly hear his familiar voice as he ties together personal and biblical stories in handing our fears over to God. Lucado does not brush aside fear altogether, though: “Jesus doesn’t condemn legitimate concern for responsibilities but rather the continuous mind-set that dismisses God’s presence (p.46).”

I appreciated chapter five, My Child is In Danger, in which Lucado discusses the weight of responsibility all parents face, along with the accompanying fear (both imagined and real). He rightly notes, “No parent can sit still while his or her child suffers (p. 57).” Lucado gently points readers back in the direction of God’s grace & mercy by reminding us, “After all, our kids were his kids first… Before they were ours, they wer his. Even as they are ours, they are still his (p.58).”

Fearless includes a discussion guide in which readers are guided through three steps in each lesson: Examining, exposing and battling fear. I think Fearless will be an encouragement to many readers, especially those who are already acquainted with Lucado’s work.

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A quick aside: Did Max Lucado have a moustache before? I could have sworn he did. The author’s photo in Fearless, though, looks to me like Alex Trebek did post-‘stache.